Acharagma aguirreanum

Tilcayo Cats original · Plants · Sources and editorial assessment · Originals retention rule

Acharagma aguirreanum is a small cactus native to Coahuila in northern Mexico. Kew accepts it as a species in the cactus family, Cactaceae. Mexico's biodiversity agency CONABIO records it as endemic to the country and lists its IUCN status as Critically Endangered.

Appearance

The plant has a rounded body covered in small projections bearing clusters of spines. Huntington Botanical Gardens describes cultivated plants with blue-green skin and mostly dark brown spines, approximately fifteen in each cluster. The flowers are less than two centimetres across, cream-coloured and often marked with red along the backs of the outer floral segments.

Habitat and field observations

Janeba and Kalas visited the Sierra de la Paila in February 2007 and reported plants on low hills, in washes and on limestone ridges. Many grew exposed to direct sun, although others sheltered beneath vegetation. Most adults were single plants, but one specimen formed a substantial cluster. The plants they examined had numerous flower buds, but none was flowering during the visit.

Their observations showed that the cactus still occurred in the area despite unsuccessful searches by some earlier visitors. The authors nevertheless described it as rare and localised, and discussed mining as a threat to the surrounding desert habitat. A successful historical search does not establish the size or trend of the present population.

Names and conservation records

The species was described as Gymnocactus aguirreanus in 1972. It was subsequently placed in Thelocactus and Escobaria before the combination Acharagma aguirreanum was published by Charles Glass in 1997, in a work dated 1998.

CONABIO's profile records the Critically Endangered category in its IUCN 2025-2 field. This records the status carried in that database release; it does not mean a new population assessment was conducted in 2025.